In the year 1707 after the Liberation of Arkadia, barbarian hordes invaded from the South. They were tall, strong, skilled warriors with black skin, and they migrated north in groups of minimum fifty male fighters, about as many women, and some children, too. They also brought with them large herds of the finest cattle the Middle Lands had seen in quite some time. They were all fatigued from their journey, but still a fearsome host.
This was probably the cause for the shift in the nature of their invasion. At first, they were merely migrating. The first groups that arrived settled just within the borders of Abracia, one of the Middle Lands, began to till the earth, and seemed to be preparing to give up their nomadic lifestyle. These early arrivals were tolerated, for the rulers of these areas thought of them as potential new subjects, and they did nothing wrong. But it didn’t take long before their attitudes changed. The people native to these areas felt threatened by the newcomers, and soon the number of migrating groups rose to ridiculous heights.
After a few months the first clash between native militias and barbarian warriors took place. A group of Southerners wanted to cross the River Aligos at Winifred’s Ford in order to reach the sparsely populated areas beyond, but had no way of conveying their purpose to the locals. Neither were they accoustumed to asking for permition to cross a river. The natives were scared beyond all reason, of course, when almost two hundred barbarians — some hundred and twenty of them warriors — with a twice as numerous herd of cattle approached their town. They sought to the village tower, and began firing arrows at the Southerners. At first the Southerners merely raised their long hide shields, and the arrows were deflected. They did not return the fire with their massive, more powerful composite longbows, for they understood that the villagers were scared, and they had no quarrels with them. But when a few stray arows killed a couple of children, honour demanded that they avenge their fallen. They pulled back, and sent the women and children away — that is, those women who were married, and thus didn’t stand rank and file with the men on the battlefield. Then they began firing back. Their first volley decimated the men on the tower walls, and it seemed as if they were content with this, for they started to withdraw and prepare for the crossing, not expecting the weak Northmen to have the courage to do much more than cower behind their stone walls.
Their expectations were wrong. Winifred’s Ford was a strategic town and as such the local militia was reinforced by twenty of the Abracian King’s cataphracts. Now, these lead the sally, and their heavily armoured warhorses ploughed deep into the ranks of the retreating barbarians. The gap behind them was quickly filled by the militia foot, and an intense, chaotic battle ensued.
Initially, the Abracians had the advantage because of their surprise attack and the shock of the cataphracts’ charge, but with the exception of these cavalerists their battle prowess was horribly inferior to that of the barbarians. The Southerners didn’t take long to realise what had happened, and soon they were driving the natives back towards the tower. The militia were aided a little, then, by support fire from the walls, but it soon became obvious to the experienced cataphracts that they were fighting a lost battle. So the thirteen of them who still lived changed their objective from defending the tower to breaking free and warning the nation. Their commander spotted the weakest point in the barbarian ranks, and evetually he and three of his knights broke free.
Without the support of the heavy cavalry the militia were doomed, and within ten minutes every single villager, with the exception of the strongest of the women, was slain. Normally, the Southerners would have halted their onslaught after the death of the last soldiers — after all, there is no honour in killing women and children — but they were lost in the bloodlust the Abracian sneak attack had awakened in them, didn’t register the gender or age of the pale skin their short spears pierced. The few women who survived to be enslaved did so only because the attacking male barbarians were too busy raping them to remember to kill them. Those women who first ran into their barbarian sisters were not so lucky, if that is a proper phrase to use in this context. Perhaps it is more correct to say that the women of Winifred’s Ford were unlucky in different ways.
This was the beginning of what would later be known as The Savage Wars.
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